


More Than Less

by anonymous_sibyl



Category: The Sundering duology - Carey
Genre: Female Protagonist, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-01-07
Updated: 2007-01-07
Packaged: 2017-10-03 08:07:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,197
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15927
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anonymous_sibyl/pseuds/anonymous_sibyl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She, Cerelinde, was a Lesser Shaper. She followed.</p>
            </blockquote>





	More Than Less

**Author's Note:**

> This work is licensed under a [Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License](http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/us/). None of the media or characters written about in my fanfiction belong to me and I make no profit from these works.

Who was to say what was good and what was bad? One person's tender mercies were another's vilest of depravities. The plan of Haomane Lord-of-Thought was not to be understood by the Lesser Shapers, only followed.

She, Cerelinde, was a Lesser Shaper. She followed.

Lately she had begun to wonder if she had been led. Lord Satoris had been calm at the time of his death, too calm. He had been a Shaper, could he have shaped her? Would Haomane have allowed a Lady of Ellyl to be swayed by one such as Satoris Banewreaker?

No. She had done what was needful. Her gifts were small, lying in the domain of what-ifs and might-have-beens, she was nothing to the Shapers. Prophecy's Lady. A pawn.

_More than pawn, Lady, but less than one who acts alone._

There were days when she pretended the whispering voice in her mind was Tanaros Blacksword, others when she feared it belonged to the Banewreaker or his heir the Dreamspinner. Most days she realized the voice that drowned out the pealing horns of Meronil was her own.

"My Lady?" A tentative question interrupted her reverie. "It is nearly time."

Nearly time. Yes, she had heard music and song, those had been real. The sticky ichor on her hands had not.

"Thank you, Meara. I will come."

With a nod the madling left her mistress's quarters. Something had changed in Meara in those last days at Darkhaven, just as it had changed in Cerelinde. For good or ill, she could not tell, but the changes were there. Perhaps that was why she had done what she had done.

"You should not have them here."

"Aracus!" He could not take the breath from her body, Satoris' gift was denied the Ellyl, but the swelling of Arahila's gift of love made her heart sing. "You would gainsay me my small pities?"

"I would deny you your foolish mistakes." He swept her into his arms, laughing when his sword tangled in her gown and the soumanie in the hilt made the cream silk pulse red. "I would protect you from harm."

"Hush, my Lord." Cerelinde brushed her fingertips across the lips of her king. "Still your mind. My madlings will bring no harm to this place."

_Yes, because now they dance to your tune. And what will you do when they begin to dance the steps you have not spoken, only thought?_

"Your madlings," he said, capturing her hand in his and squeezing her fingers, "are waiting to see you married. Are you ready, my Lady?"

"I am."

And so Haomane's tool held tight to the hand of her husband-to-be and tried to not think of prophecy or choices on her way to be wedded. Of those things, her husband-to-be thought not at all.

But the madlings... the madlings thought.

* * *

They were Ushahin Dreamspinner's once, or he was theirs, Cerelinde was never sure and Meara would never explain. The other madlings spoke not at all and this question was not pressing enough to excuse coercion.

Events unfolded as Cerelinde had seen with her gift. They settled into their new home, far from both the beauty of Meronil and the black calm of Darkhaven, the madlings and Cerelinde both, and if Aracus thought it odd that as went his wife so went the madlings, he did not say, at least not to her.

Nought was heard of the Dreamspinner.

Peace enfolded the land. Whose peace she did not know.

* * *

"Eat, my Lady." Meara gestured at the tray she'd placed before her mistress. "You must eat more."

Cerelinde pressed a hand to her abdomen and turned away, the sight of food making her stomach roil. "I am unwell, Meara. Leave me in peace."

_This, also, is needful._

"Needful," she murmured. "I do what is needful."

"Yes, mistress." Meara beamed as Cerelinde took bread from the tray. "Needful."

Surely Meara had not heard the voice. No, of course not. The fancies of breeding women were notorious, even among the Ellyl. This, too, could be dismissed.

* * *

Aracus Altorus was proud. He had done the impossible, fought a dark enemy, gained mastery of a soumanie, and made peace where it had never been. And there, in his wife's belly, the culmination of all he had worked for: the halfbreed child who would unite the races.

_It was you who slew the Shaper. Not him._

Cerelinde stroked her bulging abdomen, felt the ichor on her hands and skin. Had he wanted to be slain? Had it been needful? Had it been the wish of Haomane or of Satoris himself?

"Celebrate, my love!" Aracus took her hand and twirled her in dance. "Look! My people, yours, and even your madlings rejoice for you!" He rubbed calloused hands over her belly and smiled. At his hip, the soumanie glowed red.

* * *

She spent days, weeks, in her rooms ignoring all else. There was so much she needed to know and Aracus, indeed the rest of the court, were a drain on resources she did not have. At first she asked them to go, sighing in relief when they did, later when she hissed in anger the madlings barred her door. She was well-protected.

"Can there be peace, Meara?"

Meara ducked her head before answering. "I have never known peace, my Lady, and I would not know it now."

The gift spilled out and she graced Meara with the peace and pain of what-might-have-been. The madling writhed on the ground, tears flowing from her eyes, and Cerelinde watched and wondered.

_Yours now, Lady. They are yours now. Have care. How many times may you break them until you, too, are broken?_

She awkwardly dropped to her knees, cursing the swelling belly and Haomane's prophecy which had stolen her inborn grace, and stroked the madling's brow. "Peace, Meara. Tell me of peace."

Her only answers were screams.

* * *

He was first there when once again her doors opened to the world, eyes on her belly even as his voice spoke her name. Aracus Altorus, husband and king, wielder of a soumanie, father of her unborn child. He who would heal the sundering and bring Haomane and the other Shapers back to them. He lived his destiny just as she lived hers.

"My Lord," she said, in the melodic tones of a Lady of the Ellyl. "Forgive me." She stroked her abdomen and felt the ichor penetrate her being. "Women are foolish when they are breeding."

"You are well?"

"Quite well, my Lord. Our Lady is quite well." Meara scurried away at his harsh glance.

"Your madlings have become overly familiar, Cerelinde."

She placed her hand on him and drew her fingers from shoulder to wrist, lingering where his hand rested on the pommel of his sword. "They desire only my happiness."

"As do I."

"Then you shall have it."

He was a master swordsman, but surprise in the guise of love belonged to Cerelinde, Lady of Prophecy. He fought not when she touched the soumanie, smiled indulgently when she drew forth his sword.

_What little is a king after a Shaper?_

The soumanie flared once, then died.

Clutched to her stomach, blood marking her gown, it burnt once again.


End file.
